Aquaculture improving?..The Fish Farm Thread

Here’s a recent letter from Alexandra Morton.


Hello,
I hope all of you are doing OK with the pandemic we find ourselves in.
I am writing because the Minister of Fisheries has a critical decision that will influence the future of the Fraser River sockeye and all species of BC wild salmon. The 2020 Fraser sockeye forecast return is much lower than last year, which was the lowest in the history of Canada. We are watching extinction in play.
I spent the past five months examining sea lice on hundreds of juvenile salmon throughout southern BC. This was an unexpected effort triggered by observations of high lice levels on young salmon in the Discovery Islands. I diverted funds from virus research to fund my incredible team to sample and photograph young salmon from Campbell River to Port Hardy and with the approval of the Nations, also in Nootka Sound. What we found was that the salmon farming industry has lost control of its sea lice to the point that wild salmon were in severe distress everywhere we looked, except the Broughton Archipelago where First Nations won the authority to remove several salmon farms every year and the positive impact on young salmon was unmistakable.
Last winter I sat on the Minister's Fish Health Committee where we discussed how DFO should handle rising drug resistance in sea lice in salmon farms. On March 1, DFO issued the industry new Conditions of Licence and the option they chose was never voiced at the committee meetings or in the First Nation consultations that several nations asked me to sit in on.
DFO removed the limit on farm lice completely for 42 days during the time period that young wild salmon migrate to sea. I believe they did this because the only way they could bring the three companies into compliance was to grant them permission to have as many lice as they wanted. I resigned from the DFO committee to make sure my name was not used to endorse this, and I have stopped asking DFO to protect wild salmon, I have turned to the powerful First Nation leadership throughout BC who have a strong mandate to protect wild salmon.
The impact of the lice was heart-breaking, so much suffering and waste. I am grateful to the Nations of the Broughton Archipelago. As a result of their efforts I saw beautiful, sparkly, energetic little salmon - as they should have been everywhere.
I launched this video last night to let people know that on September 30 the Minister Fisheries has to decide whether to enact or ignore Justice Bruce Cohen's recommendation #19 - if we want Fraser River sockeye the salmon farms in the Discovery Islands (off Campbell River) must be removed if they are having greater than minimal impact. I have included the Minister's phone numbers so you can let her know that you will be watching whether she finds the salmon of the Fraser River worth saving.
In my opinion, the minister cannot look at the young salmon migrating through the Discovery Islands and honestly say the risk of the salmon farms to them is "minimal." I believe DFO has been captured by the Norwegin interests operating farms on this coast and what we are seeing is a scandal that will change this coast forever if we don't let her know that we are watching how she responds to Cohen recommendation #19.
Funding for my work has become critical as I continue to do the research and outreach to make people aware that there is nothing we can do for wild salmon if they are not reaching the open ocean. Thank you to all of you who have become monthly donors, even the smallest amounts are helpful because there is no overhead here... just the work.
https://www.alexandramorton.ca/donate/
Please consider sharing this video and/or going to my facebook page and sharing it from there. I welcome all your thoughts on what else we can do to remove salmon farms from the Fraser River sockeye migration route.
Thank you all,
Alexandra Morton
 
We just heard a rumour from a trusted source that the government may make an announcement soon on fish farms. No doubt they’ve taken notice of the 500 phone calls our supporters made to their Members of Parliament!

We do fear they may announce something that delays the removal of these fish farms. They’re so good at delay, distract and deny. Now isn’t the time to let up.

We have to send out another wave of outrage. We have to ensure our Members of Parliament know there’s only one thing that will make us happy. It’s pretty simple: GET FACTORY FISH FARMS OUT NOW!!! Can you email your MP now?

We don’t want a plan for fish farm removal in 2025.

We don’t want another study to examine fish farms.

We don’t want an expert committee to investigate fish farms.

And we DON’T want anymore empty promises.

We want #fishfarmsout before Sept 30th!!!

This year’s Fraser River sockeye return is slated to be the worst ever! Getting factory fish farms out of their way is something the government can do now to help.

Can you take a minute and send an email to your MP and tell them to get fish farms out of the Discovery Islands so migrating wild salmon don’t have to swim through their parasites and viruses?

We are making some noise. They can hear us. But we have to crank it up a notch.

Please send them an email now!
 
All,

I really hope that if the FF's are removed that the same advocates to get rid of them are prepared to stand up for the results - I hope we see the fantastic returns that you all have been predicting. The video Birdsnest shows seems to really cast doubt on all of your finger pointing, but lets assume that piece of science is propaganda and AM's is the real goods. I am not saying you won't be right, but if you are wrong and we killed another industry in Canada, somebody should stand up for the result. We have a lot bigger issues brewing than the FF's but all the best on your proposed shut down.
 
It's been my experience that staunch believers in the porous, open net-cage technology are always looking for any faint-hope good news published on the various industry news sites and PR firms. It's unfortunate, but totally a human reaction to change and conditioning. Religion is like that.

The video attempts to look at a few data points on only 1 study that lack robust numbers of surviving wild trout - and thereby dismiss not only that specific study - but all past and future studies on the impacts of sea lice. It's both disingenuous and taken out of context to satisfy the pro-open net-cage pundits, IMHO - whom then seem to wish to share the newest "good news" with others they assume are presumably only less educated. Not sure who was paying his bills, neither - as that was not disclosed (spoiler alert: he's the head of the aquaculture-based marketing company, Callander McDowell & apparently friends w Vivian Krause.).

It's what I call the faint-hope video - and if the author was instead serious he could have submitted his rebuttals to the peer-review journals that the study was published in like sometimes other debates in the aquaculture literature have gone. Didn't hear about it - if he did.

There have been many threads on this forum that have posted literally dozens - if not hundreds of peer-reviewed studies on the numerous deleterious effects that FFs can and often do have on wild stocks - including increases in sea lice loading and mortality. A partial list of only some of them include:
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/fish-farms.68678/page-36#post-885177
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/what’s-destabilizing-b-c-’s-wild-salmon-stocks.67968/page-3#post-857851
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/sea-lice-and-fish-farms.64546/page-21
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/sea-lice-and-fish-farms.64546/page-18
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...e-fish-farm-bailouts.55220/page-7#post-686955
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...g-criteria-politics.37507/page-49#post-453928
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...g-criteria-politics.37507/page-31#post-453563
and especially this one:
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...pposing-salmon-farms.61340/page-3#post-773312

So the sea lice issue has been debated ad nausaum on these threads. Going closed containment would prempt and close that argument, would it not?
 
Last edited:
agentaqua said:
It's been my experience that staunch believers in the porous, open net-cage technology are always looking for any faint-hope good news published on the various industry news sites and PR firms. It's unfortunate, but totally a human reaction to change and conditioning. Religion is like that. The video attempts to look at a few data points on only 1 study that lack robust numbers of surviving wild trout - and thereby dismiss not only that specific study - but all past and future studies on the impacts of sea lice. It's both disingenuous and taken out of context to satisfy the pro-open net-cage pundits, IMHO - whom then seem to wish to share the newest "good news" with others they assume are presumably only less educated. Not sure who was paying his bills, neither - as that was not disclosed. It's what I call the faint-hope video - and if the author was instead serious he could have submitted his rebuttals to the peer-review journals that the study was published in like sometimes other debates in the aquaculture literature have gone. Didn't hear about it - if he did.

There have been many threads on this forum that have posted literally dozens - if not hundreds of peer-reviewed studies on the numerous deleterious effects that FFs can and often do have on wild stocks - including increases in sea lice loading and mortality. A partial list of only some of them include:
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/fish-farms.68678/page-36#post-885177
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/what’s-destabilizing-b-c-’s-wild-salmon-stocks.67968/page-3#post-857851
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/sea-lice-and-fish-farms.64546/page-21
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/sea-lice-and-fish-farms.64546/page-18
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...e-fish-farm-bailouts.55220/page-7#post-686955
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...g-criteria-politics.37507/page-49#post-453928
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...g-criteria-politics.37507/page-31#post-453563
and especially this one:
https://www.sportfishingbc.com/foru...pposing-salmon-farms.61340/page-3#post-773312

So the sea lice issue has been debated ad nausaum on these threads. Going closed containment would prempt and close that argument, would it not?
Click to expand...

I don't know, would it? As a devil's advocate, what if the sea lice issue is more natural in its cause and the finger pointing was misdirected? I don't have a dog in the fight, but remain really skeptical that this is the smoking gun.

If you are right and we see returns that we saw decades ago, thanks be to God. If we are wrong, what do we do then? Apologies to all the out of work people probably won't cut it. So, I hope all the anti-FF advocates have a plan. This is science by trail and accusation. Maybe you are right and the video posted by Birdsnest is all a lie. I hope that is the case because shutting down the farms along that run highlighted had no impact. Can you refute the data he used? Is it made up? Again, I just don't know.
 
I have followed this issue for many years now. It’s not just here, but all over the world studies are showing a very serious impact to not only wild salmon but many other species, including searun cutthroat. I feel very confident that if fF’s were removed that we will see higher returns, simply because many more smolts would make it out to sea.
The impact to jobs is a 2 sided coin. FF’s have drastically impacted many of our local jobs. In fact, the local jobs that have disappeared as a spin off to the salmon farms are many more than what the fish farms provide. So I look forward to a return of those jobs.
 
Stephen Kowalski said:
I don't know, would it? As a devil's advocate, what if the sea lice issue is more natural in its cause and the finger pointing was misdirected? .
Click to expand...

Without a doubt, I would place my bet on improved wild salmon runs if their was a 10 year moratorium on all open net pen Fish Farms in B.C.
 
I didn't say the video was "all a lie" - instead I posted it was: "disingenuous and taken out of context". Not only does a few data points necessarily not make a subject invalid or valid - neither does 1 critique throw out all the other dozens if not hundreds of studies or past and future evidence of harm from open net-cage FFs. That would indeed be "disingenuous and taken out of context". I also posted that is the author was serious about his claims that he could submit his rebuttals to the peer-review journals that the study was published in.

Also, as I and others have posted numerous times is that as far as impacts go - it's death by a thousand cuts - but the marine mortality combined is most often the single largest impact for most species, runs & years. I believe that in areas adjacent to open net-pen aquaculture - some years that extra mortality can be quite significant & detrimental to local wild salmon runs. Over time that has a serious impact. That is the many years experience world-wide from many peer-reviewed and non-peer reviewed studies and some of those studies can be referenced from the above links I gave or going onto Google Scholar (About 5,780 results): https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0,5&q=wild+stock+impacts+sea+lice+aquaculture&btnG=

Yes - you are right - it is indeed science - which should be taken seriously in how we regulate and allow this industry to operate....
 
Aka in other words don’t expect their to be more fishing opportunities with the removal of fish farms.
 
wildmanyeah said:
Aka in other words don’t expect their to be more fishing opportunities with the removal of fish farms.
Click to expand...
It is my belief that rebuilding the wild salmon runs is priority #1.
With the Fish Farms moved to dry land a slow recovery is all we can expect as a major amount of damage has already been done.
With Fish Farms continuing their growth we can expect smaller runs and less sport fishing opportunities.
On southern Vancouver Island and Renfrew, most of our Sport Fishery now is supported by American Hatcheries where they have little or no contact with Fish Farm disease and sea lice.
 
Pretty hard to rebuild wild runs runs in rivers that have non stop gillnetting.

We don't need fish farms in our waters but you aint gonna have fry swimming past the farms if there is no spawners on the beds.

As per the American fish swimming past fish farms or not.It is the sheer volume of hatchery fish that Washington, Oregon and California pump out each year that is the reason why we are catching their fish not their interaction with fish farms.
 
Whitebuck said:
Pretty hard to rebuild wild runs runs in rivers that have non stop gillnetting.
We don't need fish farms in our waters but you aint gonna have fry swimming past the farms if there is no spawners on the beds.
As per the American fish swimming past fish farms or not.It is the sheer volume of hatchery fish that Washington, Oregon and California pump out each year that is the reason why we are catching their fish not their interaction with fish farms.
Click to expand...

I totally understand your frustration with the illegal and often legal indiscriminate net fishery in the Fraser River, but I do not think you can put the entire blame on this practice for the dismal Sockeye returns in recent years.
The Fish Farm sea lice and disease problems in Clayoquot Sound is having a major impact on their Chinook fishery.
https://clayoquotaction.org/
 
index.php
 
I am completely against fish farms in our waters.

Just wondering what stocks in particular have been identified as passing by FF in the top of Vancouver Island.
 
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